Do Your Own Thinking

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Knowing and then using that which you know are in reality two different and distinct issues of life. Unused or unapplied knowledge and information are totally useless. For good things to happen, applied knowledge and evaluated experience have to be put into action before significant results can be achieved.

Are you doing all your own thinking and deciding for yourself?

Your actions and activities are all the end result of the totality of your own thoughts and beliefs. Your actions, not just your words, expose the real you.

Confidence and courage are the two mainstays comprising the real report card on your life. (1) What you know and (2) what you do with the sum total of your knowledge are the two major foundational building blocks upon which you construct your entire life and it’s productivity.

In order for you to accomplish real, lasting, and eternal rewards and blessings, there must be,…or be developed,…a true Spiritual dimension to your personal life. You will never achieve maximum effective use of your life, unless and until you begin using your life for the benefit and blessing of other people as is openly and boldly expressed for you to do within the pages of Holy Scripture!

Now I realize that some of you readers and/or listeners will take exception to my last sentence and it’s statement of truth. But, be that as it may, I have still told you a truth of life….with or without your personal approval.

If you don’t leave room in your life and your activities for God to join you and participate therein, then great power, strength, performance, and accomplishment will never be as good as they could have been.

We all serve a loving, caring, just, and jealous God. He wants to be included in your life. He demands and commands that we include Him in the living of our life. When you do this, when you are obedient to His instructions, great blessings are sure to follow.

Studies have been made by various groups throughout world history that tell us that approximately 80-90 percent of the world’s population is associated with one religion or another. Among this staggering number of people, an overwhelming majority hold to the same religious beliefs as their parents and grandparents before them. Such statistics give us a great advantage into understanding why and how most people tend to make their decisions.

Most people do not usually investigate, reflect upon, or question their beliefs, opinions, or assumptions. Many of our own decisions have been made for us and based as they are on our history and ideology—on the beliefs that have been passed from generation to generation—and are absolutely predictable.

The most significant beauty of thinking for yourself is by doing so, you have become empowered to make your own independent decisions. Whenever you think and decide for yourself, you are able to avoid the traps and pitfalls into which so many people become entrapped. These prisons, traps, and pitfalls such as unexamined bias, and stubborn, habitual thinking can and will hold you captive for the rest of your life. Have you ever overheard someone saying “oh he thinks and talks just like his dad…” or “don’t waste your breath, he is only going to say the same thing he always says…” You see, friends, when you think and decide for yourself by exercising independent thought, you are able to escape the terrible trap of living someone else’s life. A good example would be that when you take a political or spiritual stance on any issue of life, or you choose a political candidate to support or reject based upon your own convictions,…they are your own personal choices and positions,…not simply the ones you grew up with in your parent’s home.

When you think independently, you choose a career, find a personal relationship partner, and make other most important life decisions based solely upon your own values, wisdom, and critical thinking instead of being guided by unconscious influences.

Whenever you think for yourself,…you and you alone…decide what’s most important, and what needs to be accomplished during the living of your life.

Are you getting a grasp on what I am trying to explain to you? Here are few questions I would like you to ask yourself. It is a sort of self test just to see if you are a product of some else’s thoughts and habits,…or one solely of your own.

Where do you spend most of your family vacations?

What make or model of automobiles do you drive?

What sports activities do you like or in which you participate?

Who is your favorite professional athletic team?

Whose hairstyle do you prefer?

What college did you attend?

In what profession or industry are you working?

The list of questions could go on and on. Are you a product of someone else’s thought patterns or are those solely your own?

If your parents were tough and strong disciplinarians, there is a very strong possibility that you will also be the same. If your parents were weak or lenient in their raising their children, there’s a good chance that you will likewise be the same.

It would be wise for you to remember this truth of life. People are born innately healthy,…but develop patterns of performance early in life based on negative or positive influences around them. Now consider this true statement very carefully. If a person has fallen victim to advanced and ultra negative influences in their lives, there are for certain going to be great and most probably negative or even disastrous consequences that result,…unless a conscious decision to change their manner and way of living and thinking is immediately made.

You must be vigilant and on guard at all times as concerns the type and kind of people with whom you regularly associate. Their influences will effect you based upon the type of people they are and what their values are. Never permit any negative “guilt trips” or “you-are-not-good-enough” inadequacies to be poured or dumped into your own mind. Do not allow negative influences into your own thoughts. Such negative influences often times come in the form of thought or word patterns based upon the expectations of those around us about how we are going to think and act in any given situation or expended efforts.

Think for yourself. Make your own evaluations of the events and activities surrounding you rather than allowing other people to determine what your decision should or is to be. Thinking and deciding for yourself using your own brain will alter and change your life in a very big way in the years ahead.

Living your own life based totally on your own individual dreams and personal desires is absolutely critical for providing the opportunities for you to create your own happiness.

Who is the Captain of your own boat? Is it you or is it somebody else? How you answer that question will make a world of difference as to how you live your life, how you conduct yourself and your affairs, and what you actually accomplish with the living out of your own life. There is an old saying that goes like this….“I would rather be the captain of my own rowboat, than the First Mate on somebody else’s steamship.” Independently thinking for yourself is the key that will ultimately unlock the door to your own happiness and peace of mind.

Learning to think and act, not out of habit, but rather with your own creative and independent ideas, is powerful and very transformative to the living of your life. The truly successful people in life always march to the beat of their own drum. The real champions of life always call their own shots using their own minds.

If you are bound up or shackled with the limitations of other people’s thoughts and influences “fencing you in,”…please permit me to share with you two simple techniques you may use to break free:

1. Resist the urge to make decisions quickly. Successful people rarely make snap decisions. Whenever we react instead of carefully respond to a set of circumstances or situations it always forces us to speak or write out of habit instead of out of reasoned thought. Whenever a set of activities or situations forces you to make a quality decision,…stop what you are currently doing and think things through. Consider all of your available choices and alternatives first, before making your final decision.

2. Gather opinions from people who have different points of view
and have had different experiences. Whenever you ask for advice
or solicit feedback, we are almost always drawn to those people who
already agree with our own point of view. This kind of advice only
serves to reinforce our own preexisting decision. Hearing differing
opinions and perspectives will help you break out of the “ruts” of your
repeated processes of thought. You might end up thinking the same
manner and way as your advisors,…but your opinion will be your own!

God gave each and every person born into this world their own brain. It is the command and control center of your body and the connecting link between you and your Creator. He desires you to develop it,…pack it full with good and positive knowledge and experience,…and then use it to the service of mankind and for the glory of God.

Peace And Love to All of You…………………..Poppa Bear

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Comments

Do Your Own Thinking — 3 Comments

  1. Great message Dave!

    You’ve come a long way with your writing style. You’ve always been a Strike Thrower, but now you’re hitting Dead Center with your teaching. Thank you for sharing. Keep asking God to heal your body since you need to be visibly back in the game changing people’s lives.

    Ain’t it Great!

    Joe

  2. Thank you so much for those powerful and true words.
    Your advice and life teachings open my mind to a different level of education and understanding of my
    capacity to be somebody.

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